ADJOURNMENT

Ms ALDRED (Monash) (16:54): Australians are not thriving; in fact, many are suffering right now. We've never been less united. We've never been more divided.

This week was the anniversary of the atrocities of October 7, the single greatest, deadliest attack on Jewish life outside of the Holocaust. Has this government learned nothing in the two years since? Here at home, our Jewish community is terrorised on a daily basis.

We have seen businesses owned by Jewish Australians attacked, staff intimidated and harassed, synagogues firebombed, children racially vilified on the street. Where has the government been on this? They've been nowhere to be seen because keeping Australians safe, all Australians safe, is not a priority for them.

This government is not looking after Australian families. It is not hard to look for the impact of what is the biggest collapse in living standards in the developed world while driving a spending addiction that is chaining the next generation of Australians and those yet to come with intergenerational debt. And it's no small figure; it's a $1.2 trillion debt bomb.

Tell me—has anyone said to you over the course of the last three years, 'Gee, I'm really better off right now than I was under the last coalition government'? No-one can say that. They can't.

This government has presided over cost increases across the board. Amidst a couple of modest mortgage cuts, we've had the experience of 12 mortgage increases on the trot from this government. Power prices are up.

Remember the grand promise about a $275 energy cut? It was based on the government's modelling. Where is it?

I haven't seen it. My community sure hasn't seen it. The rest of Australia has not seen it.

I'm proud to come from a region that generates wealth for the rest of Australia, and they're getting no support from this government to continue doing that. Their grocery bills are going up. Their rent is going up, if they can find a place to rent.

I heard a terrible story from a local woman in Drouin last year. Her son is a truck driver. He's a single dad with a couple of young children.

He could not find anywhere to rent locally. He was nearly homeless, and he has now moved back in with his mum to make sure he and his kids have a roof over their heads. That's the sort of thing we're seeing every day of the week because of the cost-of-living crisis in this country.

Many small businesses in Monash are seeing the impact of Labor's cost-of-living crisis. Monash small businesses are champions of our local community. Right now, it has never been harder to own and operate a small business in Australia.

Small-business owners have never worked harder for less and faced more risk and red tape than under this government. And small-business owners are voting with their feet. There are nearly 34,000 fewer employing small businesses now than when Labor came to office.

It's an epidemic of closures. Small businesses look after everybody else before themselves. Right now, because the rest of the community is hurting, many of these small businesses are feeling it too.

When you effectively cut someone's disposable income, you cut the flow-on economic benefits to small-business owners as well. In a cost-of-living crisis like this, households understandably might not have the means to go out and take their family to the local pub, and that has a flow-on impact on the rest of the wonderful regions like mine. There's so much to do in the Monash electorate.

Just last week, I had the privilege of speaking at the launch of ArtConnect 2025 at the Meeniyan Art Gallery in South Gippsland. Meeniyan is a wonderful town, and it's a gateway to the Prom and towns like Walkerville and Foster. ArtConnect is a great initiative.

It provides locals and visitors to our region with a connected map and a direct invitation to open studio days across South Gippsland. It brings together over 80 local artists across 24 studios to come and have a look at some of the incredible things we've got on offer. On top of that, it draws people into our pubs and bakeries, spending money at our local petrol stations—all of the things that are just so important to our local economy.

We've got some marvellous things in Monash, so come and visit, come and spend your money, and come and enjoy. House adjourned at 17:00 Federation Chamber Thursday, 9 October 2025 The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr Boyce ) took the chair at 09:29.